A world full of miscreants?
by Severus my hero
Summary: Cho is murdered and her spirit travels through the people present revealing their many sins and the self that they have hidden from the individuals in their lives for a long time. However, will it travel to the one responsible for her death? R&R hg,hc,rhr


**Disclaimer: I do not own "Harry Potter" or anything associated with it: the characters, places and events mentioned in the books and movies belong to JKR, Bloomsbury, Scholastic, and Warner Brothers etc.**

**Summary: Cho is murdered and her spirit travels through the people present revealing their many sins and the self that they have hidden from the individuals in their lives for a long time. However, will it travel to the one responsible for her death? Read to find out!**

**A/N: This is written for the spirit challenge by random.thoughts at the HPFF forums. The challenge stated the following things:**

**1. The spirit travels though muggles and wizards alike. It shows no favourites, no opinions, and no thoughts. Watch its travels, and learn. (The perspective change as the spirit travels from one person to the next.)**

**2. The spirit can enter an individual only once and requires physical contact.**

**3. There has to be a moral/lesson.**

**A little note to all readers: This story does have a plot but it is almost insignificant, as it was inspired with the way Katherine Mansfield wrote Prelude and At the Bay in the sense that the characters and their thoughts are highlighted more than the storyline. Her stories did not have a plot what so ever but I did introduce a little plot and mystery in the background to bring in another moral lesson as well as to build the reader's interest. Unfortunately, seeing as I am not nearly as talented as Katherine Mansfield was, therefore my story does have authorial comments, which I cannot omit. **

**Moreover, Albus Dumbledore is alive in this story. Please do not hate me for it because he was necessary for the last theme. I do not think I could have used any other character for it. This among a few other interesting things renders the story AU.**

**Enjoy!**

**A world full of miscreants? **

The air was thick with the heavy scent of the many delicious things Kreacher had cooked so graciously for the dinner party at Number 12 Grimmauld Place. The din of amiable conversations filled the dining room, as everyone with the exception of her appeared to be enjoying themselves.

Cho was sitting on Harry's right hand side silently contemplating as to why she was even there. It seemed that everyone would have been perfectly happy even without her presence. She sighed and looked askance at her husband who was engrossed so deeply in a conversation with Hermione Granger-Weasley that the whole world appeared to have disappeared for him. She could not stand that look of profound concentration on his face as Hermione talked dynamically about a new discovery made in magical theory.

The fact that Cho still harboured jealous feelings towards Hermione would have been news to Harry as she was a master at masking her true feelings; yet sometimes she wished he knew so that he might sever links with the woman. Her friend Marietta told her that it was wishful thinking as she was quite sure that Harry was so in love with the two-brained freak that he would rather leave Cho than her. Even the thought of such a possibility sent a shiver of violence down her body awakening the primal instincts that resided within her, fuelling the images that her brain delivered to her in the form of frequent dreams, so much so that they seemed to accompany her even in the waking hours of the day.

_Cho was holding a cane in her hand as blood dripped from one of its corners drop by drop. On the floor lay a woman with dark frightened eyes, holding her head: the source of the blood. Her hand shook as she stared at the bushy brown hair stained with the sinister red dye. She felt tears flow down her cheeks as she brought the cane down one more time ending the plight the existence of this woman had introduced into her marriage. Cho knew that she should feel sick and guilty at what she had done but instead she experienced nothing but a mad joy at seeing the life escape Hermione's eyes. _

"_I've sent you far away, Hermione Granger. So far that no matter how hard you try you would never be able to interfere in my life with Harry, ever!" she whispered hysterically into the night as blood seeped through her victim's head._

Every time Cho had such a vision, she felt numb and broken inside as if she had lost control of the very essence of her being; however, a part of her enjoyed seeing the terrorised eyes of the woman who was the cause of much distress for her.

"Cho, would you pass me some more peas, please?" Hermione asked beaming at her and holding out her hand in an assumption that Cho would be kind enough to say yes. For a second Cho found herself saying simply, "No, why don't you get off your lazy arse and get them yourself. You don't mind helping yourself when it comes to my husband, why let the peas be any different?" However, such savagery was beyond Cho's courage, so she simply smiled back at Hermione.

"Of course," a good-natured response issued out of her unwilling mouth as she passed Hermione the peas and then resumed her previous state of sullen disposition.

Harry had been coming home late for a month now. If it would have been a day or two in a week Cho might have accepted his excuses that his work demanded his constant attention and that there were difficult cases upon difficult cases that had been piling over his head; but Harry had been coming home late every single day. She was growing more frustrated by the day and her suspicions were rising with every excuse he made. Cho was certain that Hermione had something to do with this but did not have the courage to come out right and say it. She wanted the woman out of the way, quietly; with no humiliations marring the image of perfection that many people assumed was Harry and hers married life.

Cho noticed that Harry was getting up from his chair and her eyes instantly went to the place where Hermione sat but there were no obvious indications of her finding an excuse for making her way out of the room too. Strangely, she found herself sitting alone in the room with her even after everyone including Ron, Ginny and Dumbledore had left.

She found her resolution divided as one part of her wanted to stay here and keep a sharp eye on Hermione while the other insisted on getting away from the woman before the mere sight of her made her sick to the stomach.

"I think I should go freshen up," she finally said and climbed the stairways in the hall making her way to the master bedroom. The room was dark and a strange eerie atmosphere gripped the unnatural blackness that met her eyes. She ignored her instincts and walked into the room, drawing her wand to light the lamps. However, the moment she flicked her wand a searing pain rose in her back. Some queer force was being applied to her lower back as a stinging sensation mixed with the pain. The impression repeated itself a few times until she could make it out no more. She felt a pair of weak arms trying to catch her as she fell into the deep abyss of death hearing her last sound in the form of a chilling scream.

666

Hermione needed a release from all the pent up frustrations that were overwhelming her existence. It had been a long time since she had really had a heart-to-heart conversation with anyone. Ron used to be that one person who would listen to her for hours on end but now it seemed that the endless chasm that had been dug up between them would be impossible to cross. She would have preferred to talk to Harry, Luna or even Ginny but they all seemed to have conveniently disappeared. Hence, she had come to talk to the only person in that house whose whereabouts she was aware of: Cho. Unfortunately, the moment she had entered the room Cho seemed to have fainted, her lower body drenched in blood and a knife stabbed into her kidney.

She did the only thing she could think of as she held the dead woman's body; scream. It was a queer sight to see that the house, which appeared to be almost empty a second ago, erupted with life. It seemed that Hermione had breathed life into the building's very walls with her scream. Numerous people rushed into the bedroom where Hermione sat shaking with shock. They all came to a dead halt the moment they caught sight of Cho.

"Cho," a rather frazzled Harry whispered as if he could not believe his eyes. Hermione searched for her husband in the crowd of people only to be unusually incensed by his absence. Forgetting the scene around her, she got up biting her lip. The rage that had swollen like a cancerous lump in her soul did not permit for anything else to occupy her thoughts. However, as she made her way towards the door an angry voice stopped her.

"Hermione, explain this!" Harry gesticulated hysterically at the scene in front of them as Albus Dumbledore examined the dead body.

"I need to find Ron," she said with such venom that startled Harry.

"Yes, where is Mr. Weasley?" The question was issued calmly by Dumbledore but it sent a shiver throughout the audience.

"I don't know; that is why I need to find him," Hermione said and Dumbledore too was caught off-guard by her sudden outburst. It was obvious that Hermione was not in her senses at that moment. Only one goal lay in front of her and no one was going to get in her way.

"Ron!" she yelled, the inexplicable anger flowing through her veins. When no reply came, her eyes flashed and she marched down the stairs. Oh how she hated her husband in that moment! She could almost see his eyes as she disclosed this piece of information.

"_Honey, I need to talk to you," she would say._

"_Mmmm," Ron's mouth would obviously be occupied with food as her pig of a husband could rarely be found without one thing or another being stuffed between his hungry jaws. _

"_I have a lovely gift for you," she would say in a honey sweet voice. His eyes would grow wide with the pleasant surprise and for once, he would put away his food to pay attention towards her. _

"_Did you make the apple pie that you promised me last night?" He would say and she would want to bash his head but nonetheless compose her feelings into a subtle vindictive smile, as she would reveal the overwhelming package of her long suppressed feelings to him. _

"_Ronald Weasley," she would get down on one knee and hold out her empty palm. He would look at it with a bemused expression and then into her eyes with incomprehension and trepidation. _

"_Ronald Weasley, I hate you with a passion. Would you do me the honour of accepting this little token of my misery?" Oh, the pleasure she would feel in mocking his words and actions on the fateful day she had agreed to marry him. Her palm would come into brutal contact with his cheek and she would carry a smug smile on her face, as his wide baffled eyes would transform into infuriated narrow slits. _

"Hermione!" a hand enclosed around her wrist as she was stopped by Harry just before she stepped onto the last stair.

666

Harry had to admit that Hermione was acting most curiously. She could be suffering from a tremendous shock, which of course was understandable seeing as how she had just seen a woman die. More accurately, she had seen _his wife_ die. However, there was another possibility: she could be trying to make a getaway. Harry was rather sceptical as to how far that idea could be true, but a voice kept on muttering into his ears saying, 'she _was the only one_ in the room when Cho died.'

"What?" Hermione snapped.

"You can't leave without explaining what happened! If you haven't noticed Hermione, my wife is lying dead in that room." Harry pointed towards the bedroom as he felt tears sting his eyes.

"Oh, so suddenly I have become the bad guy! I happened to be the only one in the house who had not disappeared of to;" she shrugged her shoulders thinking, "who knows where when this happened. I should be the one demanding alibis, not you!"

As huge tears fell from Hermione's eyes she started taping her foot on the floor impatiently. Harry was well aware that she wanted to know where he had been. Even the thought of his whereabouts caused guilt to rise from his gut and make its horrible way into the back of his throat. He felt sick and regretful at what he had been doing while some brute son of a bitch was stabbing his wife mercilessly. He sat down on the bottom stair and brooded over the many ways he could have prevented this from happening, _if_ he had been with Cho and not with...

_As Harry listened to Hermione's boring lecture on some new spell that had been invented in The Department of Mysteries and was about to be introduced to the mass public, he caught Ginny's eyes. _

"_I have personally approved the use of this set of spells as they would revolutionise the whole idea of magic as we know it..." The way Ginny was twirling a lock of her vibrant red tresses was making Harry dizzy. She gave him a lingering glance and then turned on her side to resume her conversation with... _Fleur?

_Harry knew that Ginny was being a tease. A smile played on her beautiful face as she pretended to listen to Fleur's bragging. One of her fingers trailed a path down her neck drawing his attention towards the many freckles sprinkled across her milky white skin. As she played with the hem of her collar, she threw back her head and a low throaty laugh escaped her lips. The exposed skin of her neck sent shivers down Harry's body and he felt as if he was going to lose control very soon. As he got up from his seat, he could have sworn he saw a flash of Ginny's... Oh my, things _were_ getting hot in that room._

_As he made an escape into the kitchen, he caught a glimpse of Cho's disapproving yet knowing face. Did she know? Drinking a chilled glass of water, Harry tried to calm his nerves down but to no avail. He paced the kitchen conjuring the most disturbing images into his mind but his mind always wondered off to picture a scenario involving him and Ginny in a very compromising situation. _

"_That cannot happen in this house!" he rebuked himself quietly._

"_What cannot happen in this house?" a seductive voice said from behind him. He jerked back and looked into the sultry brown eyes, which met his gaze. _

"_Ginny," he warned as she drew closer towards him._

"_What? Afraid of being caught by that woman you insist on calling your wife?" She scoffed while grabbing him by the collar and crashing her lush red lips onto his. Harry groaned in pleasure but nonetheless pulled away quickly._

"_Ginny, what if someone comes in? Almost all our family and friends are in the room right next door!" He whispered urgently. _

"_Oh but the very risk is such a turn-on, don't you agree?" She kissed him again and this time Harry was in no position to argue with her. She pulled him closer tugging at the collar of his shirt and Harry felt a leg wrap around his waist._

"_Ginnnnny," Harry moaned unsure whether he was disapproving of her actions by doing so or admitting that he was pleased; very, very pleased. She ground against him once more and that settled the matter. Harry cupped her arse and swung her onto the counter, gently trailing kisses down her neckline..._

"Harry?" Hermione's voice seemed to be coming from a distance although she was standing right next to him. It had been a year since Harry had first walked down this disrespectful path. For some reason Harry had enjoyed every minute of the journey but now the mere thought left his body aching with pain. He had not realised how much he loved Cho's smile, the strange things she sometimes cooked and her tendency to become overly sentimental at the smallest of incidents until now when he had lost it all. Tears filled his eyes as he remembered he had promised to take Cho to watch a play the following day. He had not been looking forward to the idea but now he wished for nothing more than to have her back even if it meant that he would have to endure those boring things for not two hours but for every single minute of his life.

"I was in the kitchen with Ginny," he replied. "We were talking about the cannon's chances in the next quidditch season." The monotonous sound of his voice reverberated in the empty hallway as he tried to subdue the overwhelming torrents of guilt rushing towards his heart.

As Harry was saying this, a flash of red caught his eyes and Ron came in from the stairways that led into the cellar. He was holding a bottle of wine and a huge loaf of bread. Harry could not stand the sight of his long time best friend. Here he was caught in the biggest mess that Fate could have created for him and there he was eating away at the loaf of bread, which by the way Cho had placed in the cellar personally, with not a worry in the world. He lunged at him with a determined look on his face snatching the loaf away, lightly brushing his hand with his.

666

"Where were you?!" Several angry voices met Ron's ears as he stared around with a befuddled expression. He had no idea why everyone looked so suspicious. It seemed to him as if they thought he had committed a murder or something.

'How preposterous?' he thought as he took a swig of wine from the bottle he was holding. Only then did he catch sight of his wife who was covered in blood. His eyes went wide and he stared from Harry to her to Dumbledore to his father incomprehensively.

"I was..." he looked down at bottle in his hands and the bread that Harry was holding close to his heart. For a second Ron had a humorous image play in his mind. The tenderness that Harry was showing towards that piece of food gave Ron the impression that he was holding a child. A sinister laugh escaped his lips as he thought about the idea of gobbling up the bread, which for some very inexplicable reason had started to resemble a baby!

Everyone looked at him as if he had quite lost his head. Molly Weasley stepped forward and looked Ron straight in the eyes. Her stern expression forced Ron to shrink under her blazing gaze. Something was wrong; he could feel it in his veins that something was very, _very_ wrong.

"Mum?" he squeaked thinking hard, trying to remember whether he had been involved in something that could give rise to her wrath.

"Put that bottle down this instant!" she screamed at him. Ron looked at the bottle hungrily and then at his mother as if she was the cruellest being on Earth to suggest such a thing.

"I don't want to..." he muttered as if he was not the thirty-five year old man of the present but the five-year child he once used to be.

"Of course he doesn't want to put down that precious bottle of his!" Hermione screeched startling everyone. "He wouldn't set it down even if it meant saving the whole lot of us from dying! Why would a man who chooses his darling food over his family everyday care about setting it aside just because his mother asked him to!"

"I..." Ron was hurt by Hermione's words. There was no truth in the matter what so ever. He would never choose food over his family! The idea was ridiculous! He shook his head and took out a piece of cake from his pocket. While he stuffed it into his mouth, he pointed at Hermione's clothes and asked, "Whaffhaffenn?"

Hermione just raised one perfectly waxed eyebrow at him and he swallowed, "What happened?"

"I'll tell you what happened, Ron!" Harry who had been observing the exchange patiently until that moment seemed to have had enough.

"Cho was killed," he blurted out the words as if they were a curse. "She was stabbed by someone!"

"At least five times in her dorsal section, possibly more," Dumbledore's voice rang out from the top of the stairs.

"I...I don't know what to say," Ron faltered.

"You usually don't!" Hermione snapped at him rancorously.

Ron glared at his wife unable to grasp what had gotten into the woman today. He put his bottle down looking smugly at her while Hermione just rolled her eyes and snorted maliciously. He made his way towards Harry in order to offer his consolations, however at this point the doorbell rang and everyone turned their attention towards the door.

"I'll see who it is," Ron said turning away from his current path relishing the means of escape that had offered itself to him.

The moment Ron opened the door his eyes widened in surprise as Dudley Dursley greeted him jovially. A woman stood next to him who looked weary and slightly annoyed about something. In what seemed to be a trance Ron accepted the flowers handed to him by Dudley and returned his hug half-heartedly.

666

Dudley Dursley was fuming at his wife. She had forced him to accept his cousin's invitation by nagging constantly that it sounded very rude to refuse such a nice offer. Did she not realise that they were about to enter into a house full of freaks who could turn them into toads or lizards or indeed anything they pleased to turn them into? Of course, she did not realise that because the wretched woman was unaware of the magnitude of the problem. She had not seen the havoc these people could cause! She had not had her tongue inflated, a pig's tail grown on her backside nor has had her soul almost sucked out by some crazy invisible monsters!

However, now that he was here he had to appear respectable just as his mother had taught him. He was to behave in such a way that would show these people who was better: these barbaric good for nothing magicians or a respectable company owner like him.

"Dudley?" a strangled and rather bewildered voice entered his ears.

"Harry!" he uttered feigning both excitement and glee at the sight of the man he had not seen in almost twenty years.

"What are you doing here?" demanded Robert Westley, or whatever his name was.

"I was invited to join Harry at a dinner party he was organising," he said feeling slightly insulted by the red-haired freak whose family had destroyed their living room a long time ago. Samantha produced the invitation letter and gave it to him. He pondered over the letter for a long while and finally showed it to Harry whose eyes grew wide at the sight of it.

"Cho's writing," he muttered to himself but his voice was audible enough to be perceptible for Dudley.

"If we have come at a wrong time..." Samantha said in what Dudley hoped was a guilty tone, he never could really tell.

"Actually you have!" snapped Robert and a woman with unruly hair rebuked him by saying, "Ron!"

"We're very sorry," Dudley said feeling the heat rise in his cheeks but as soon as he made to turn away a teary-eyed Harry grabbed his arm and pulled him inside.

"Cho, my wife, invited you," he said wiping away the tears that had started to brim out of his eyes. "She had been insisting for a long time that I should invite what was left of my family. She thought it was proper that I should reconcile with them. I am sorry," he sobbed startling Dudley as well as everyone else dearly. They had never really seen Harry cry like that, just as he had not. Patting his back Dudley tried to console him all the while looking around for some sort of explanation.

The bushy haired woman led them into a strange looking living room and sat them down. As she explained to them what had occurred earlier that night Dudley felt dread seep into his soul. He had just entered the scene of a heinous crime. Samantha also looked as if she was having second thoughts about the whole dinner issue.

"...so you see..." Dudley lost track of what she was saying but it was obvious that Samantha was drinking in her every single word.

He remembered just how Samantha had convinced him to come to the dinner tonight. She had called him names upon names and insisted that he was being lazy as always. Of course, Samantha was barking mad for even thinking such a thing. There was not a lazy bone in his whole body. Samantha should think twice before she uttered such a thing. It was the fruit of his hard-earned money that she ate every single day, wore in the form of her fancy dresses and converted into those lavish decorations she insisted on filling their house with.

"_Dudley!" Samantha shouted in exasperation as he sat on the couch with a packet of crisps watching the highlights of last night's football match. _

"_Hmm?" he glanced distractedly at his wife and then directed his attention back towards the television. _

"_Dudley!" Samantha's voice sounded deadly when she uttered them through clenched teeth but nonetheless he was too consumed with his task to pay attention. In frustration, Samantha picked up a cushion and threw it at him, hitting him square in the face._

"_What you do that for!" He demanded angrily._

"_What is wrong with you Dudley? Why do you insist on staying packed up in the house all day sitting in front of that wretched box?!" She screamed. _

_The moment she finished Dudley turned towards the 'wretched box' but this time Samantha marched across the living room and pulled the plug out of the socket. Dudley's angry retort was drowned by Samantha's chilling screech. _

"_GET UP AND GO TO WORK!"_

"_Barley will take care of everything, he always does." Dudley replied calmly and motioned for Samantha to restore the plug. When she made no move to suggest that she was going to listen to him, his shoulders slumped in dismay and he grudgingly got up from the sofa. However, before he could make a grab for the plug Samantha had already taken a cutter and snapped the plug off the wire. _

"_Make yourself useful Dudley! If nothing else, find something to fix around the house!" she said spitefully handing him the wire and throwing the plug into a wastebasket full of banana peels to ensure Dudley would not try to retrieve it. _

_Dudley threw the wire aside and irately made his way into the bedroom where he slipped under the covers. _

Furious with his conscience to spite him with such a memory Dudley turned his attention back at the bushy haired witch who he gathered was named Hermione. To his amazement instead of seeing Hermione, he found another woman sitting on the seat in front of him and talking to Samantha animatedly. However, unlike the rest of the guests this woman looked joyous and gleeful. _Was she happy that Harry's wife was dead?_

Dudley had to admit that the woman was very attractive. If her hair was any indication, she belonged to the same Westley family as that Robert or Ron or whatever the hell his name was. The woman seemed pleasant enough but her mannerism gave Dudley a strange feeling. Something suggested that she was up to no good.

"Ginny it's your turn," Hermione's voice came from the doorway; it seemed that the woman had been crying.

"Oh well, I guess I better be going," Ginny held out a hand to Samantha and smiled in Dudley's direction.

"Her turn for what?" asked Dudley.

"Weren't you paying attention, dear? The authorities have come to investigate and they are taking statements." Samantha explained as Dudley shook Ginny's hand.

666

"It was nice meeting you two," Ginny said as she left the living room and entered the dining area where the two officials were taking statements. Hermione's session had been long but Ginny was sure she would with be done quickly. All she had to was stick to the story that Harry had come up with and she would be all right. Anyhow, the story was partially true seeing that both of them had been in the kitchen although they were playing more of a game than talking about one.

"Miss Weasley?" Ginny nodded in the direction of a tall fellow with a tanned complexion and dark auburn hair. His shabby suit suggested that he had bought it second hand. He did the same thing that every other man she ever met had done: gave her a one over. She rolled her eyes and inwardly snorted: as if.

She looked around and saw that Harry was seated sullenly in one of the dining chairs. She did not like the look on his face and tried to catch his eyes.

"So, Mr. Potter here tells us that you two were in the hallway..."

"Kitchen," Ginny corrected knowing exactly what the man was doing.

"Oh yes, of course, you two were in the kitchen talking about quidditch," his tone suggested that he was sure that they were lying through their teeth. Ginny sometimes wondered why they used such an idiom; a person could not lie through their ears now could they!

"That's correct," Ginny said dryly.

"Tell me Miss Weasley how long can a person possibly talk about quidditch? You two, according to what Mrs. Granger-Weasley had stated, were gone for almost half an hour."

"Well I don't know about you sir, but we lot can go on for hours." She said and then hastily added as an afterthought, "About quidditch."

"I see," The other man had blonde hair and a very pale face. It almost seemed that someone had sucked his lifeblood out. He was wearing his work robes and Ginny felt the irritation rise in her. She was not one of those people who appreciated hard workers who jumped at the chance to work a few extra hours. She considered their lives mere pathetic excuses for one, all the time sucking up to their superiors, licking the dirt off their shoes, busy doing this and busy doing that while their bosses spent their time being entertained by women like her.

The way his eyes pierced through hers Ginny could feel the heat rising through her cheeks but made sure to guard her mind from any sort of penetration.

"Very well," he made a small note onto his notebook. "Were you and Mrs. Potter close?"

"I wouldn't say that we were," Ginny said and then looked at Harry wondering if she had answered correctly. However, the only sight that met her eyes was of a broken man staring blankly at the wall in front of him as if it held all the answers to his miseries yet was choosing to elude him.

"I see that you aren't that upset. It almost seems as if you are pleased that Mrs. Potter has departed from this world." His penetrating gaze never left hers but Ginny kept her mind. She laughed lightly at his comment.

"Sir, I am sorry but if you think that everyone in this world is going to bawl their eyes when you die, you have another thing coming. I am not happy that Cho has died but neither am I overly sad. _I am sorry_, but that is all, because I don't think that anyone deserves to die the way she did." What she said was true because if Cho had died a natural death Ginny would have been relieved to have the woman out of her and Harry's way but seeing that she was brutally murdered by some savage, she did feel sorry but as she said: that was it.

"In that case, may I see your wand Miss Weasley?"

For years all Ginny had cared about was a life of comfort and luxury. She did not care how she got the things that she desired as long as they kept on coming. She had dated all sorts of guys, from men twenty years her senior to those who were barely of age. However, there was one thing that was common to all of them: a huge bank balance. While they showered her with gifts, she bestowed upon them her fake love. Needless to say, all of them were turned away with nothing but broken hearts within a few months.

Nevertheless, the moment she met Harry in France a year ago things changed.

_She had been sitting beside a pool waiting for Jack, her newest boyfriend, in a prestigious hotel. _

"_Ginny?" a deep voice caught her attention and she lifted her eyes to see who it was. She was met with a pair of bright green eyes hidden behind wire-rimmed glasses._

"_Harry? What are you doing here?" She was pleasantly surprised to see him._

"_I had a meeting with the French minister for magic today." He explained._

"_You're staying here?" she asked astonished._

"_Urm, yeah," he answered smiling widely at her. "It has been a long time since I last saw you. Where have you been?" _

"_Oh, here and there," she said enigmatically not wanting to reveal her true activities. Forgetting all about Jack, she got up from her place and asked Harry if he would like to join her for a walk. However, Harry was too busy checking her out in her blue bathing suit. Nevertheless, a simple nod was enough for Ginny to take his arm and lead him towards her favourite part of the hotel._

_Never in her entire life had Ginny experienced such a date. Of course, at the time she had not dared call it a date considering five minutes into the conversation Harry had started talking about his life with Cho. It was almost as if the man felt guilty for the exchange they were sharing. Ginny was in awe of him simply because of the reason that she had never met a rich guy who she actually liked and all the time one such jewel was waiting to be exploited right under her nose. This was a person she could marry; this was a person she could spend her whole life with. There was, however, that one little problem: He was already married! Why was it that all the love stories have one complication or another!_

"_Why don't you come up for a cup of coffee to my apartment?" Ginny suggested after a long pause in their conversation._

"_Oh I don't think that that is a good idea," Harry said smiling politely._

"_Oh come on it's just a cup of coffee," Ginny pouted her mouth slightly.  
_

"_No I think I should get going. I am leaving tonight and I have a lot of packing to do." Harry said uneasily while staring at what Ginny assumed were her lips and made to get up._

"_Your packing can wait, I'm sure," she said._

"_Ginny," he looked frustrated. "I don't think this is a good idea. Really," he assured as he began to walk._

_A soft breeze played with her hair as she grabbed his arm before he could go. Even the air around them seemed to be shaking its head in disapproval. Ginny tugged at his sleeve and pulled him down on top of her. On the moist lush grass they made love for the first time, behind the rushing sound of water from the fountain where the birds sang softly their praises for Nature. _

"I suppose the two of you can leave now," the blonde said to Ginny and Harry.

As Ginny left the dining hall, she saw Albus Dumbledore pacing in the hallway. The moment she entered his vicinity he looked up and grabbed her by the arm.

666

"Miss Weasley is this by any chance yours? I found it in the hallway," Albus showed Ginny a piece of jewellery. If her facial expression was anything to go by, he was quite certain that she had never seen it before.

"No, it isn't mine." Albus sighed frustrated by her answer. He had asked every single person in the house if this was theirs claiming that he had found it on the stairs and that it looked extremely expensive. In truth, he had found it near the scene of murder covered with Cho's blood.

"I don't understand," he muttered to himself. Either the murderer was well aware that he or she had dropped this at the scene of the crime or none of those present in the house had committed the felony. The whole situation was most curious.

"Mr. Dumbledore," one of the ministry officials addressed him. "We have questioned everyone present; it is only you who are left." Dumbledore was astonished that they should suggest such a thing. Did they really think that he was involved in it somehow? His pride was hurt but nonetheless he calmly followed them into the room.

"Please sit down," he pointed towards a seat and Dumbledore calmly took it taking in the appearance of the dark fellow. He was tall and his dark red hair was long enough to touch his shoulders with its silky tips. He had the strangest features: a small nose hardly noticeable in the presence of his heavy lips. However, Dumbledore found his eyes the most intriguing. They were something between a light hazel and grey. It gave him a rather alien look as if he had transfigured them or perhaps used muggle lenses to change their colour. However, something told Dumbledore that that was the natural colour of his eyes. The thought added to the queerness of their appearance.

"Where were you Mr. Dumbledore at the time of the murder?" the other official was a pale man with bushy eyebrows. He had short blonde hair and deep blue eyes. However, his hands were unusually gnarled and were even more wrinkled than his were. It sent a chill through Dumbledore's body to see such a young man had to suffer the consequences of the contortious curse.

"I was in the yard admiring the little bird's nest which is growing there," both men exchanged looks. "It is the most fascinating sight when a bird builds its nest, bringing tiny twigs from every corner it can find and then arranging it so practically and at the same time so artistically that…"

"Yes, yes. Fascinating, fascinating," the blonde interrogator interrupted Dumbledore's lecture.

"You say you were in the garden staring at some bird's nest," the second interrogator it seemed did not know whether to feel pity at the old man's mental health or sceptical and suspicious at his lie.

"Yes, it is situated in the apple tree in the northern corner of the yard. The bird is a female sparrow and has laid four healthy eggs. I am assuming that one of the eggs, that would be the fifth, might have fallen down from the tree as I found a few pieces of the shell a few feet away."

Dumbledore produced the shards for the officials to see but they still looked sceptical.

"You could have easily conjured that shell, Mr. Dumbledore,"

"I am afraid you weren't paying attention in your NEWT Transfiguration class, now were you?" Dumbledore raised his eyebrows. "There are five exceptions to the Gamp's Law of Elemental Transfiguration and they are all based on the idea that live objects cannot be properly conjured or transfigured from non-living objects. We may be able to produce imprints or copies of what appear to be birds, my favourites are canaries, but we cannot create the life in those objects. They will be at fault in one way or the other. If indeed I had conjured or rather tried to conjure a shell or worse an egg, some of my life would try to seep into it rendering me weak but more importantly there would be obvious faults in the shell's structure and function. The egg would be disfigured, useless. However, as you can see that this is a shell perfect in every way, except perhaps for the fact that it has shattered. Only the powers controlling Nature can manage such a miracle. We can't even produce dead objects properly, like food."

Both the officials looked befuddled by what Dumbledore had just tried to explain to them. It gave him a strange sense of satisfaction to see the confusion in their eyes as he smiled kindly at them.

"If you still remain unconvinced regarding my alibi, I would suggest that you check for yourself whether the nest is there or not. I am sure you can differentiate between a healthy bird's egg and a disfigured one, a proper live bird and a pure imitation of it."

"We'll see," the blonde interrogator said coldly giving his assistant a look that suggested that he was to go and see. Grumbling he obeyed and walked out of the room.

"I don't want to sound disrespectful, sir, but when we say that none of you can leave the country or go into hiding until the investigation is complete, I mean none of you." He was stern but instead of giving him the impression that he was being obedient Dumbledore nodded his head graciously as if he was doing the men a favour. The silence in the room stretched on for a few minutes before the other man came in.

"The nest is there and so are the four eggs. It is indeed a sparrow and it looked normal to me." He said a little breathlessly.

"In that case may I see your wand sir," the blonde official held out his hand and Dumbledore stared at it. He knew that if he wanted he could easily refuse and these officials were obviously no match for him.

"I don't think I can allow that," he said. "If you want to test it give me _your_ wand and I will test it for you."

When the blonde interrogator opened his mouth to protest, the dark fellow held up his hand and quickly presented his wand to Dumbledore.

"Priori incantatem,"

"Of course," when Dumbledore performed the charm a silvery platter issued out of his wand and floated in the air indicating the last spell his wand had cast was a summoning charm on the object. Then a second image shot out indicating that Dumbledore had apparated outside the door of Grimmauld place and a third image showed that he had been cleaning Fawks's cage.

"That would be all," they began to pack up.

As Dumbledore left the dining hall and made his way into the living room, he saw that everyone was sitting in silence. Harry was sitting near the fireplace staring off into the amber shades of the dancing flames, Miss Weasley was by his side a hand on his shoulder trying to console him but it seemed that he was not really listening. Mrs. Granger-Weasley was silently sobbing into Mr. Ronald Weasley's shoulder who, on the other hand, seemed to be chewing on a piece of bread. She hit him hard on the shoulder and burst into more hysterical tears. It was strange to see that Harry's cousin, Mr. Dudley Dursley was still there. He seemed to be talking to a very sober looking Molly Weasley and his wife was trying to calm a very disturbed Mrs. Chang.

How curious it was that none of these people seemed to fall into the category of suspects? Everyone had an alibi, which seemed honest enough. None of them could have been guilty of the murder they were all suspected for committing.

Dumbledore paid his respects and parted with comforting comments, apparating to Hogsmead. He walked slowly to the headmaster's office; he needed to share his thoughts with the portraits, they were perhaps his only true companions now. As he climbed the stairs, he found his thoughts straying off to the events again and again trying to find something that he had missed but to no avail.

He poured himself a glass of Madam Rosmerta's delicious oak-matured mead. As he sipped his drink, he repeated every detail of the night's events to the portraits and quietly heard their thoughts and arguments. However, at the end of the hour he felt a strange sensation grip his heart. It was as if an iron hand was clenching it. He choked and coughed but the constriction was getting worse.

"Oh dear," he whispered in a hoarse voice. The occupants of the portraits became frenzied and started to rush off in all directions to try to find someone to help the man.

"I have been poisoned?" he choked astonished at the possibility as his glass fell to the floor and shattered. Darkness began to surround him as he struggled on the floor as if trying to free himself of invisible ropes. He was swaying his arms and legs and it seemed as if he was trying to ward of death, gesticulating wildly asking it to stay away, pleading and then finally giving in.

However, just before he passed onto the next world he heard a soft but sinister whisper reach his ears from somewhere deep and hidden, a place at the same time both far and near.

"Tsk, tsk, tsk... too proud to realise that it could be me! _I_ killed Cho Potter. One thought, a few sketchy loops and she was dead, just like you... tsk, tsk, tsk..."

**A/N: Okay, so was it very confusing, rather crazy and totally weird? I hope you still liked it though. There are a huge number of morals/lessons in the story and I hope you can pick out a few of them. I don't want to list them here because I would sound like a really preachy old granny but if you can find absolutely none whatsoever then I may give you a few hints. For that you'll have to review though. **

**:)**

**Thanks for reading!!**


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